


Ace of Cups

by UNHhhh



Series: Ace of Cups [1]
Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: 1920s, F/F, F/M, Healer, Hurt/Comfort, slavic witchcraft
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-13
Updated: 2017-04-13
Packaged: 2018-10-18 11:51:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10616355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UNHhhh/pseuds/UNHhhh
Summary: A small town southern girl runs into a swamplands Slavic witch.





	

                Legend has it that in Wainscot, Louisiana, there’s an abandoned plantation home outside of town, and inside that home resides a witch. No one knows exactly how the rumor started; it was just before the turn of the century, when, without the radio and record player to keep you entertained, all one had were stories, passed around like a game of telephone, morphing into an even greater legend by the time it got back to you, so bent out of shape that you wouldn’t even recognize it as your own original creation.

                Such was this legend's history. A concerned farmer who lived adjacent to the home brought up the fact that the last family who resided there, outsiders from Europe known as the Zamos, had mysteriously disappeared in the 1890s, leaving behind their cotton fields and vegetable gardens and Antebellum furniture. This was slightly unsettling to the townspeople- who just leaves without saying goodbye? - but of even more concern was the fact that the farmer noticed the vegetable garden never seemed to rot or wither away; rather, it looked as well tended to then as it had when the family still lived in Wainscot.

                This, of course, got the people talking. A garden needed tending, and after a suitable amount of interrogations by the townspeople _towards_ the townspeople, it was decided that none of them were in on it, and that something fishy was indeed going on. The story found itself spinning multiple webs, morphing into a handful of outcomes, until the one most probable outcome stuck: a witch lived there.

                Wainscot does, after all, reside in southern Louisiana, and its inhabitants weren’t unfamiliar with voodoo or Santeria or any other kind of magic. It wasn’t so farfetched that someone could be residing in the home who was also practicing magic. So far, nothing had happened concerning the home and its assumed inhabitant, and so the general consensus decided upon during a monthly mayoral meeting was to leave the home be and simply forget it even existed at all.

                Teenage boys, though, don’t forget such a juicy story so quickly. And so one evening in 1911, after ten years’ worth of horror stories building upon each other, a group of rambunctious and curious boys teamed up and ventured out to the home to see if there really was a witch after all.

                They never came back.

                It is only known that they visited the plantation at all because the fifth member of the group had backed out at the last second and, after sufficient nagging, finally revealed to the town their master plan of smoking the witch out and bringing her into town to expose her.

                After that, it was strictly forbidden to visit the home, and doing so would be punishable by fine or even jail time after repeated offenses- if the offender came back at all.

 

 

**\- - - - -**

 

 

                Sharon Coady was not the kind of woman to take anything lying down. In fact, the only thing she took lying down was being tied up to her bedpost and thoroughly penetrated by her numerous lovers. She was not the kind of woman to let tradition guide her way, either, and it showed in her daily outfit of slacks and minimal makeup and loud claims that she would never settle down. This would have been completely detrimental to her standing in Wainscot, 1921, but her father was the local physician, and no one wanted to get on his bad side for obvious reasons.

                So Sharon’s grand displays of patriarchal rejection were tolerated. Having a whole mansion to herself most of the time due to her mother’s untimely death and her father’s career taking him to conventions everywhere but home, Sharon did what she wanted, when she wanted. Her nannies tried to reel her in but learned faster than anyone else that Sharon didn’t like being reeled in. Therefore, she was given one rule: to be at home before dawn.

               Tonight Sharon was going against her one rule, and she was going to do it with a smile on her face. Rounding up her three best friends was usually a walk in the park for her; they weren’t necessarily the goody-two-shoes of the town, and what else is there to do in a city with a population of 500 and one dancehall than to go along with your friend's sometimes questionable plans?

               Nothing, that’s what, Sharon would announce in her full and brassy voice as they marched down the sidewalk to her father’s spare Rolls-Royce. The four would pile in, wispy-haired Willa joining her in the front seat, dispensing libations taken from her father’s bar. Violet and Tracy, or Trixie as she was often called due to her affinity for tricking others, would sidle into the backseat and clutch their hats between sips of bourbon. The car’s top would remain down in the dog days of summer and well into the beginning of fall and the girls would cruise, soaking in the sun.

               Violet would make a snide comment about Sharon’s driving skills, and Sharon would inform her that she’s “been driving longer than you’ve had a period, you sleaze,” and then Trixie would cackle and Willa would shrug, and they would careen down the backroads at speeds perhaps too fast to be taken on dirt and gravel.

               The girls would routinely drive well into the evening, stopping to squat on the side of the road or wade in their undergarments through the creek. Willa would inform the girls of the town’s newest farmhands who undoubtedly patronized her family’s bar, and Sharon would imagine her next conquest and shout with victory at the thought.

               Twilight had passed, and the town’s minimal lights shone in the distance. The car’s headlights and the almost full moon were the only other sources of illumination for miles around.

               “Don’t you think we should be getting back to town, Sharon?” Trixie rubbed her bare arms. The summer was winding down and though the nights were usually temperate, tonight there was a slight chill in the air. “I don’t think any of us are dressed to spend a night out here.”

               “C’mon, Trix, where’s your sense of adventure?” Sharon gestured wildly into the air with a hand as she took a turn a little too sharply. The other girls screeched, Violet cursed and popped Sharon on her bobbed head, but she only cackled back. “We’re going on a field trip.” She explained.

               “Where to? Your sex shack?” Willa asked. It wasn’t unusual for Willa to make comments that sounded like complete jokes but were, in truth, simply her attempts to make sense of reality.

               “No Willa, not tonight,” Sharon replied. “We’re going to the witch house!”

               The usual roar of excitement and fluttering of claps didn’t pierce the sky at Sharon’s revelation. Instead, a thick silence fell over the girls in the car. The wind whipped their hair softly as Sharon drove on, and Trixie realized she had never been so far away from town on this road. It only led to one place: the swamplands. No one lived this far out anymore, not since the last century.

               “You’ve got to be joking.” Came Violet’s voice. The silence had been broken, and now Willa, Trixie, and Violet were all scrambling around in the car, talking over each other and berating Sharon, who merely laughed at their anxiousness.

               “This is ridiculous!” Willa said. “I’m the dumbest one here and I’m scared shitless!”

               “Sharon I swear to God if you don’t turn this car around- “

               “If we get hurt your father is going to fix us all up for free!”

               “Girls!” Sharon yelled over the din. The other three fell silent. “It’s a folk tale. There’s nothing to be afraid of. I’m just curious is all.”

               “Those four boys never made it back.” Trixie reminded her. Suddenly the dark trees lining the side of the road weren’t peaceful potential homes for fairies and owls. Trixie shivered, but not from the cold.

               “But do we know that _really_?” Sharon reasoned.

               “Yes! Yes, we do!” Violet yelled.

               “Shar, we were kids then! I remember those boys! I remember they didn’t come back to class after the weekend, and Samuel, he was never the same again. He still doesn’t dare to venture out of town at all!” Trixie said.

               “Fine! Fine, we don’t have to get out of the car, okay? But since we’re already out here I at least want to drive up to the damn thing, just to see if it’s even still standing.” Sharon sighed and doubled down her grip on the steering wheel.

               The three girls groaned. There was no way they were getting out of this now. They rode on in silence for a few minutes, until Willa announced, “I’m scared,” and then the girls riled themselves up again.

               “I have a date with Daniel this weekend and if I am not in one piece-“

               “Aw, you finally giving Milk a chance, Vi?” Sharon grinned.

               “He doesn’t like being called that!”

               “Well, maybe he shouldn’t be the town milkman then!”

               The gravel road abruptly ended and the Rolls Royce was traveling on a dirt path almost covered by grass. No one spoke as Sharon slowed the car down slightly and the trees fell in on both sides of the road.

               The light of the moon shone onto the dewy grass. It cast an ethereal glow across the patch of land seated between a swamp and a tree line. Beyond the tree line were fields which once probably held cotton and corn but were now overgrown with tall grasses.

               Weeping willows lined the dirt path which had undoubtedly been a very nice driveway when the plot of land had been kept up. As Sharon drove through the low hanging trees, a marble-white structure began to appear.

               “I cannot believe it.” Breathed Willa.

               It was the famed witch’s plantation home, and it stood in its two-story tall glory, reaching over the tree line and almost blocking out the moon. The girls held their breaths as Sharon drove around an ancient fountain, now defunct and mossy, and circled her car back around to the driveway.

               The girls turned in their seats and stared at the mansion. Ivy crawled up the whitewashed exterior, creeping over windows and forming large swaths of green-black foliage. The large, semi-circle steps that led to the front doors were cracked and a few bricks had gone missing. The air around the property was thick and motionless, and smelled faintly of smoke.

               The sudden creak of the driver side door opening made the other three girls jump as Sharon stepped onto the grassy driveway.

               “Are you crazy?!” Violet hissed.

               “I just want to get a little closer.” Sharon took sure steps in her wingtip shoes towards the plantation home. Trixie and Violet looked at each other with wide eyes before Trixie whipped around to the back of the car, scuffled over the trunk, and grabbed Sharon’s arm.

               “You can’t just- you said we were only looking!”

               “Let go! I want to see, I won’t be long! Aren’t you guys curious, too?” Sharon ripped her arm from Trixie’s grip and continued on her walk.

               “Yeah,” Willa said. She jumped over the car door, her long legs clad in homemade slacks with a hole in the right knee, and caught up to Sharon. The two whispered as they crept closer.

               “Trix…” Violet’s voice was soft. Trixie turned to look at her dark haired friend. Violet was watching the two walk towards the home with a look of longing.

               “You can’t be serious. You just called her crazy for doing it!” Trixie said.

               “I know,” Violet whined. “but I am kind of curious.”

               The engine rattled through the body of the car as Violet and Trixie stared at each other for a few moments. Sharon giggled in the distance and Violet broke eye contact, set her mouth in a firm line.

               “I’m going. I’m overcoming my inner saboteur and I’m going.” She announced as she opened the back passenger door.

               “Violet!” Trixie yelped. Her blood ran cold as she realized her only chance of having a buddy was walking away from her. Trixie whined, hesitated, then scuffled out of the car herself and ran to Violet as fast as she could in her mules.

               If she had known she was going to be investigating ancient, witch-filled plots of land, she would have worn a more sensible shoe, and probably would have thought twice about donning a long, flowing skirt. She also wouldn’t have come.

               “You did it!” Sharon spun around with her arms wide. “That’s my friends, yes siree! Adventure girls! Those rebel bitches!”

               Violet and Willa laughed and Trixie cracked a smile at the name the crew had been called numerous times by their peers. As it turns out, routinely going against the grain in a small town meant you were the butt of many a joke and immediately susceptible to name calling. Sharon seemed to get some sort of pleasure from it, bordering on perverse, while the other girls merely tuned it out.

               Sharon was whooping, running in circles on the wilting grass, riling the girls up, and soon they were all dancing in a circle, their laughter cutting up their mirthful chants into unintelligible phrases.

               Willa had the bright idea to collect the whiskey from the car, and they all sat facing each other, worn out and panting from their dancing and taking turns sipping from the two mason jars.

               Under a tree dripping with moss, Sharon had the girls embroiled in yet another story of her sexual conquests, this time with a man from out of town who apparently wore so much gold on his body he could have afforded his funeral at any time. She was busy explaining the physics of sex with a man who possessed a rather large potbelly when a loud crack echoed from the swamps.

               The air turned static around the girls as they went silent. The whiskey in Trixie’s hand sloshed in the jar as it abruptly stopped inches before her lips. She glanced at Sharon, who was across from her facing the swamp, and saw her wide eyes fixated on one spot.

               “Sharon? What is it?” Violet spoke between barely moving lips, and Sharon’s face went from shocked to terrified.

               “Get in the car. Get in the car!” She whispered, then yelled, and Willa screeched and sprang up from Sharon’s left side and began sprinting towards the still running vehicle.

               Sharon and Violet weren’t far behind her, the other jar of whiskey left spilled on the grass where Violet had sat. Trixie tossed her jar as well and wrestled with her skirt as she stood, gathered it in her hands and started running.

               Trixie could hear her heart beat loud in her ears, the shrieks of her girl friends yelling for her to run faster almost completely drowned out. Her breathing was heavy, and she saw Violet opening the passenger door for her to jump in.

               Suddenly the ground was coming closer to her face and she realized she had tripped. Her foot had caught on a root system suspended over the ground and her ankle twisted on the way down. She yelped, tried to remove her foot from underneath the root, but stopped when a searing pain shot up her leg. She reached down to pull her foot out of the trap when she heard the car fling up rocks and dirt, and she jerked her head up to see her friends driving away, still yelling, Violet hanging over the back of the car with a hand stretched out for Trixie to take.

               She couldn’t make out what they were saying between the rumble of the engine and her cries for help. She cursed and slammed a fist on the ground.

               The car was gone from view in seconds, and Trixie’s hands trembled as they blindly felt their way around her foot. She couldn’t take her eyes off the dust settling in driveway, couldn’t believe what she had seen. She was now alone, with whatever had scared Sharon, and she was injured and miles away from help.

               Trixie began to cry once her reality set in. She sobbed as she looked back down at her foot, her ankle already turning purple and swelling. She couldn’t move it independently at all, and her hands were shaking too bad to do anything.

               Someone was walking towards her from the vicinity of the swamp. Trixie tried to hush herself, but her stuttering breaths of pain and fear couldn’t be stopped, and she let out a fearful moan.

               The person stopped feet away from where she sat. She couldn’t bring herself to look up, but she noticed lots of dark skirts hanging in swaths off the person standing before her. They were barefoot, the tops of their feet a little dirty from encountering weeds and twigs, and there was a silver ring slid onto the second toe of their right foot. It shone in the dark despite being dirty.

               “I won’t hurt you.”

               The sound of a sweet and concerned voice caught Trixie off-guard, who just knew she was about to be rape-murdered in the swamps of Wainscot, and she slowly looked up.

               It was a woman, not much older than Trixie herself, and she looked down at Trixie with soft and curious eyes. Her arms were wrapped around her thin waist, her head tilted to one side and surrounded by a halo of wavy, frizzy blonde hair. She was frowning slightly, like someone who’s caught a child with their head stuck between two posts of a staircase. It was altogether not what Trixie had expected at all, and this made her cry even more.

               “No, don’t cry! I won’t hurt you!” The woman quickly knelt beside Trixie, who jerked away, then shrieked as the pain coursed through her leg again.

               The other woman looked down at her foot and sighed, shook her head.

               “I trip on that root every time I walk by here,” she admitted. Her voice seemed a little off to Trixie, but she didn’t have the brain power reserved to contemplate it much. The woman looked up at Trixie inquisitively. “May I help?”

               Her hands moved towards Trixie’s ankle, which was even more swollen, and if it hadn’t looked so horrible to her she wouldn’t have allowed the woman to touch her. But she was completely caught, and she had nothing left to lose, so she nodded shyly and braced herself for the pain she knew was going to come.

               Except…it didn’t. Trixie couldn’t feel a thing when the woman touched her ankle with both of her palms. It was like she was a ghost, her essence moving through Trixie without touching her at all.

               But the woman was massaging her hands firmly into Trixie’s ankle, she could see the skin rolling with her hands, the swelling buckling down under her touch. The woman looked down at her work, tongue poked out the side of her mouth, before she mumbled a few words Trixie couldn’t understand and rested her hands on her ankle.

               She looked up at Trixie with a small smile.

               “We’ll be here for a moment. My name is Katya, what’s yours?”

               The pedestrian way this woman had struck up conversation was almost enough to set Trixie off into tears again, but she took a deep breath instead. Well, if this was how her life was going to end, she might as well make it as enjoyable as possible.

               “T-Trixie.” Her voice broke as she answered. Katya smiled.

               “I like your name! It’s the kind of name a fairy would have! Like a Shakespeare fairy.”

               Trixie didn’t know what Katya meant by any of that, but she nodded anyway and smiled a little.

               “Thanks. My name’s actually Tracy, but everyone just calls me Trixie.”

               “Well, my name is actually Yekaterina, but who wants to say all of that?” Katya laughed, and Trixie began to laugh, too, until she remembered the legend of the witch. The plantation home, the one she was seated in front of right now, had been owned by foreigners. Trixie wasn’t the smartest woman in the world, but she knew when a name wasn’t American, and her brain slowly put two and two together.

               The smile on her face turned into a fearful pout, and Katya mirrored her almost immediately.

               “Please don’t be scared,” she whispered. Trixie felt like Katya could read her mind. “I only want to help you.”

               “Are you...?” Trixie couldn’t bring herself to say it. Katya looked down at her hands, and Trixie could have sworn she saw shame and embarrassment all over Katya’s face. She didn’t attempt to ask Trixie to clarify her question, and the two sat in silence for a few moments longer.

               Katya removed her hands from Trixie’s ankle and then looked back up at her with a small smile.

               “There. You should be able to move your foot now, though it’s not all the way healed so be careful.”

               Trixie stared at Katya in confusion, one eyebrow cocked. The adrenaline was beginning to wear off and she was left exhausted and cautious of the person in front of her. What had Katya done, exactly?

               Looking down at her ankle, she noticed it wasn’t half as swollen as it had been before Katya had touched her, and she moved it a little. It was sore, like waking up with a crick in your neck, but Trixie could maneuver her foot out from under the root and she sighed with relief.

               “Thank you.” Trixie uttered as she looked up at Katya, who was grinning excitedly.

               “It worked! Oh, this is good!” Katya clapped her hands together and then stood up swiftly, her skirts flying around her. She held out a hand to Trixie, who hadn’t moved at all. “Let me help you up!” she encouraged.

               Trixie slowly grasped Katya’s hand and the girl pulled her curvy form up with ease, grunting a little but seemingly unfazed. Katya took the moment to shake Trixie’s hand and giggle out an official salutation. Trixie tested her weight on the ankle and found that she could still barely put weight on it and sighed loudly.

               “We need to get you inside so you can elevate your foot,” Katya said.

               At this Trixie realized the gravity of her situation. She was injured, albeit slightly recovered, and alone with a woman who emerged from the swamps and wanted to be friends with her. Now she was being ushered into an old, supposedly witch-laden home, and she had no one to rescue her or to bounce her opinion of the situation off.

               Trixie stopped walking and the arm the shorter woman had thrown over Trixie’s shoulder slipped off, and she turned to face her.

               “What’s wrong?” Katya inquired. “Hurt too much to walk? I can- “

               “No!” Trixie said louder than she had anticipated. Katya looked taken aback. “I mean- I don’t even know you! And my friends just left me, and I’m all alone, and this is the witch house! And now I have to go inside because I’m hurt and I definitely can’t walk back to town like this!” Trixie gestured angrily to her ankle. She let out a sob and covered her face with her hands. “I’m just scared and I don’t know what to do! I didn’t even want to come here!”

               Katya cautiously walked back to the younger woman. She held out her hands, made to grab at something, and then dropped them back to her sides.

               “I’m sorry.” She said. “I should have kept in mind that you’re probably scared out of your mind right now. You don’t even know me, you’re right; why would you want to come into my house when you don’t even know me? Well, I can tell you about myself if that will make you feel better?” Katya looked inquiringly up into Trixie’s covered face, like a kid trying to please their parent. “But you really should rest your ankle, and you’re right, it doesn’t look like you’re going to be driven back to town tonight.”

               Trixie contemplated her options: stay outside by herself all night until, hopefully, her friends came back to her, or go inside with Katya and, hopefully, emerge the next day a little more healed up and not mentally scarred. She scoffed at the ridiculousness of her position and vowed to pay Sharon back for the life-threatening situation she had put her in, but she dropped her hands from her face and nodded to Katya.

               “Yeah, I should probably go inside with you.”

               “It’s okay to be scared!” Katya offered as she gingerly wrapped her arm around Trixie’s shoulders again. Trixie leaned on the shorter woman and they slowly made their way to the front door of the mansion. “It’s healthy, and that just means you’re doing something right.”

               “Maybe you shouldn’t tell me it’s okay to be scared right now, Katya,” Trixie said. Katya laughed loudly, and Trixie smiled slightly at her mirth.

               “You’re right. I’m just- let’s go.”


End file.
